


rules of engagement.

by librastrai



Series: team clvr drabbles. [2]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Ciara O'Connor - Freeform, Gen, Lavender Anu, Rhiannon O'Gormain, Team CLVR, Vionn Hei Lui, introspective
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-16 05:34:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29820174
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/librastrai/pseuds/librastrai
Summary: Remember the rules you were taught. Ciara had joked they ran like a bad date; ill timed, a lot of fumbling and at the end of the night, you still ended up alone in your bunk with your hand down your skivvies. The chorus of hushed snickers and snorts earned her a round of laps and a week on canteen clean up but she’d seen the hidden smile threatening on James’ lips nonetheless.*Ciara O' Connor introspective, set during 8x09.
Relationships: Ciara O'Connor & Clover Ebi, Ciara O'Connor & Marrow Amin
Series: team clvr drabbles. [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2026052
Kudos: 3





	rules of engagement.

**Author's Note:**

> ah marrow, they really did snatch away your best boy title this volume. ciara overhears his "bUt tHeYrE jUsT kIdS" & doesn't react well.

No one ever warned them how  _ loud _ it would be.

If it weren’t for Vionn’s hand on her shoulder, Ciara doesn’t know if she’d be able to think. The explosions, screeching roars of Grimm, the shouts and cries of those falling; it threatens to overwhelm her. If anything were to break her from the tempest of rage and grief Ciara had found herself in, it was this.

It was all  _ so much _ .

A glance up, turquoise eyes struggling to settle as a vicious tremble rocks her, they lock onto her team.  _ Her team, her family. _ It was drilled into every student from the day they started in Atlas Academy that your team? They were your family now. Not your friends, not playmates. Not people who could just be dropped like a worn pair of boots.  _ Family. _

She wasn’t going to lose them too.

Remember the rules you were taught. Ciara had joked they ran like a bad date; ill timed, a lot of fumbling and at the end of the night, you still ended up alone in your bunk with your hand down your skivvies. The chorus of hushed snickers and snorts earned her a round of laps and a week on canteen clean up but she’d seen the hidden smile threatening on James’ lips nonetheless.

He didn’t smile anymore. Neither did she.

The muscles in her jaw cinch and gaze snaps up to Lavender and Rhiannon, opposite her and steadfast, waiting for her word. She was a leader. Time to lead.

“You heard Winter. We keep this thing open, so that thing—” Vionn’s mouth pulled into a grimace, “gets put down. Got it?”

Sharp nods from both, her gaze shifted to the man beside her and her brows tugged together. A momentary flash of tiredness and Vionn’s hand dropped down to grab hers. “You with me, Vi?” A squeeze of her hand followed. “Til’ the end of the line.”

“That won’t be today.” Lavender’s voice was strong, their eyes steady. Rhiannon besides her gave a trembling thumbs up while trying to keep her breakfast down, and all together, Team CLVR shared a smile.

“They wish.”

Vine’s voice calling out an order snapped Ciara from the shared moment of camaraderie, as the tall, lithe man vaulted over the gap of the trench with ease. Despite herself, the huntress' heart  _ ached _ . Felt like it was unravelling once more, all the messy, haphazard stitching she’d done in the face of war threatening to dissolve into  _ nothing _ .

She swallowed it down with the taste of copper on her tongue, spilling from how hard she bit the inner flesh of her cheek.

“Go!”

Rhiannon was the first to throw herself into the fray, choppy blue hair swaying in the backwinds and Lavender quick on the girl’s heels. Vionn shot a glance back at his leader before following the rest of his family into the fray; if there was anyone she trusted, it was him. For the past three years, wherever she had been, he had been a step behind. A shadow  _ but so much more _ . Her brother in spite of blood.

_ Will you lose this one too? _

When her fingers touched the wet mud and came away red, Ciara felt her stomach revolt. The sensation of burning acid at the back of her throat threatening to spill. A shaky breath. She wants so badly to close her eyes and center herself, but she knows it won’t help. She’ll just see more red, the flash of steel, dying turquoise

“They’re just kids.”

Ciara’s rage was something famed, a warning, a feat to see. Too many drunken stories had been spilt over fire pits where Rhiannon would regale them with tales of Ciara’s tempests, the utter  _ storms _ she could bring to heel. Recently it had felt unending. A hurricane, sweeping everything in its path. It took all without remorse, even the girl herself.

Now there was only one person in sight.

The shove nearly sends the Faunus off kilter, the grip on his weapon almost falling slack with the shock that rings through him. Royal blues widened, words stumbled out incredulously.

“Ciara?!”

_ Remember the rules. _

“Get it together!”

_ Defend yourself from attack. _ Yet Marrow didn’t, he just  _ stood there _ , lamenting philosophies that meant little to the dead soldiers of  _ their kingdom _ , littered upon the dirt. Blood seeping into the ground. Blood now on  _ her hands _ .

“We’re not kids!  _ We’re huntsmen _ .”

_ Restrain yourself where possible. _ When was cowardice restraint? Where was the restraint from their enemies, from the shadows threatening  _ her home _ , her people, her family. Another shove and the tendons in her hand ache, for something raw, for a violence that festered in her mind and called out for an answer to this  _ pain _ . A relief.

“If you wanna’ run away and cry while Grimm kill us all, go ahead!”

_ Protect innocent life. _

The red on her hands feels like red on the snow; cold and sticky and fruitlessly grasped, as if she could gather it up and gift it back. As useless as gathering water in open hands. If she died out here? So be it. But no one else. Not even Marrow. Even if she had to be cruel, to get through to him. To keep him alive.

“But Clover would be ashamed of you.”

The huntress turned away before she could see the apprehension turn to guilt and pain on his face, her words turning to ash on her tongue. It was cruel. It was perhaps the cruellest she’d ever been, in her short life.

Another casualty of war.


End file.
